Politics and Power
This is part of A Time of Eclipse from the Core Book. Politics is just as important in the colonies spread throughout the solar system as it was back on Earth, but it is also radically different. Each habitat or cluster of stations is a separate political entity, and many of these habitats are fiercely independent. The only locations where large political entities can exist are on the marginally habitable worlds of Mars and Titan, and the population of Titan is significantly smaller than that of many of the largest pre-Fall cities on Earth. The Inner System Though nations no longer exist, they have been replaced by new political-economic entities that may well have been on the road to dominance even if the Fall had not occurred. While there are many independent habitats and settlements in the inner system, it is largely under the thumb of the hypercorps. To reduce conflict between themselves and promote the survival of transhumanity, some of the hypercorps formed an alliance known as the Planetary Consortium. This entity governs most of Mars and is in charge of the ongoing terraforming project. It also controls dozens of other habitats throughout the rest of the inner system (and even a few in the outer system). This means the Planetary Consortium rules over more than forty percent of the surviving transhuman population, making it the dominant power in the solar system. The other major polities in the inner system, the Lunar-Lagrange Alliance and the Morningstar Constellation, are also heavily influenced by hypercorp interests. In the aftermath of the Fall, the hypercorps established three important goals: rebuilding the solar system, protecting themselves from any further attacks (either by the TITANs or any other threats), and growing in both wealth and power. The hypercorps and the Planetary Consortium are exceedingly skilled at attaining all of these goals. Since popular rebellion and widespread dissent complicate these interests, the hypercorps are also adept at making certain the inhabitants of the habitats and planetary settlements they control are safe, relatively content, and, ideally, unable to cause serious problems. By extension, the second goal means they also help protect the surviving transhuman population against any repeat of the Fall. As the largest and most wellorganized entities in the solar system, the Planetary Consortium and other inner-system governments are in an excellent position to protect the people living in their habitats and settlements. This protection, however, comes at the price of freedom. The transitional economies used in hypercorp-controlled settlements ensure that most citizens are relatively well off and need not fear starvation or serious want. Many hypercorps strongly oppose bioconservatism (with some exceptions, notably among the Lunar-Lagrange Alliance), and so anyone who can afford various augmentations or morphs is free to obtain them as long as none are equipped with weaponry that can be used to harm a habitat or large numbers of its inhabitants. In return for safety and relative prosperity, however, citizens give up the ability to voice more than token criticisms of the hypercorps. The Power of the Hypercorps and the Planetary Consortium The Planetary Consortium is the only major non-local political entity in the solar system (with the possible exception of the Autonomist Alliance, which is more of a mutual aid pact than a unified polity). All of the others are based in a single specific location. Likewise, the various hypercorps transcend location. Though some are quite large, rivaling the old megacorporations of Earth in size, the majority of hypercorps are small and specialized with few physical assets, leveraging the capabilities of AIs, infomorphs, and robotics and communication technologies. Some maintain staff and work forces large enough to populate multiple habitats, but most rely on few employees, instead contracting with freelancers or other hypercorps. Many business projects consist of multiple hypercorps networked together; temporary and even ad hoc business alliances are a common affair, with multiple hypercorps partnering towards common goals. Thousands of dedicated hypercorp manufacturing and processing installations can be found on Mercury, Venus, and other equally resource-rich locations scattered throughout the solar system. Well-known facilities include Starware’s vast shipyards, the largest of which are located on Luna and the asteroid Vesta, and Omnicor’s huge antimatter factory orbiting Mercury. There are many other lesser-known facilities, including the automated mines that the mysterious Zrbny Group maintains in the Main Belt and Saturn’s rings and the qubit factory Nimbus maintains in Mars orbit. Many hypercorps eschew macro-manufacturing and instead focus on developing new technologies and new cornucopia machine templates. Aside from the numerous public hypercorp factories and labs, there is an impressive number of secure and often secret research installations, some of which are so well hidden that they are normally only accessible via highly secure egocaster connections. All manner of mysterious and often highly dangerous research occurs in such locations, ranging from experiments with the relics of the TITANs to attempts to create self-replicating nanotechnology or artificial miniature black holes. Vids and vid games are filled with stories of exotic disasters in such research stations and of heroic thieves stealing amazing wonders from them. While the reality of secret corporate research bases is normally far more prosaic, sometimes wonders are created—and there have been occasional disasters, often involving TITAN artifacts. Some corporate headquarters are similarly secure and secret, including the corporate headquarters of the fabled Zrbny Group. There are a wealth of rumors and stories about such locations. Intrepid spies, thieves, and reporters regularly attempt to gain access to these facilities, generally without success. Many attempts, especially by would-be thieves and spies, end with distinctly negative consequences, including the thieves’ temporary (and on some occasions permanent) deaths. Hypercorps also own and manage a number of habitats. Many are primarily homes for hypercorp employees, but in others large portions of the population are ordinary (non-employee) residents. Though far less controlled than hypercorp research or manufacturing facilities, these colonies are also subject to greater regulation and security than some of the autonomist-controlled habitats on the edges of the solar system. These stations are exceptionally safe places to live. Residents have access to all of the latest products produced by the ruling hypercorp (or conglomerate of smaller hypercorps) and its corporate allies. These habitats all either possess their own security forces or have some form of defense contract with a private security company, such as Direct Action or Medusan Shield, who agree to protect the inhabitants against potential threats by agents of the TITANs, fanatical saboteurs, and other threats. These same security forces also protect the hypercorps from any threats to their interests. In most of these habitats, residents have fairly open freedom of expression and biological self-determination. However, all potential threats to the hypercorp and its personnel, ranging from attempted sabotage to simple civil disobedience, are dealt with quite harshly, with serious offences resulting in forced indenture and occasionally forced mental editing (see Psychosurgery). Almost all of these habitats use a transitional economy and most residents have a high standard of living to compensate for the limits on their behavior. Many inhabitants of the more independent colonies in the belt or the outer system complain about the repressive nature of the hypercorp-controlled stations, but residents of these habitats prefer the safety and security found there to the intimidating freedom of the outer system. To help reduce dissent, residents of settlements and habitats controlled by the Planetary Consortium (and similar hypercorp-dominated polities) can vote on a wide variety of issues. The results of these votes, however, are only binding on issues that are not considered “matters of habitat survival,” “corporate policy,” or “security concerns,” which effectively includes anything related to the profits and productivity of the hypercorps involved. Votes on these matters are purely advisory, meaning that they are utterly ignored when the results are at odds with hypercorp agendas. While residents of these settlements and habitats can vote about adding a new holiday to honor some important figure or the location and design of a new park, laws regulating indentures, colony security, law enforcement, or other important concerns remain under the control of the hypercorps. This does not mean, however, that the results of elections are completely disregarded. If more than two-thirds of the population strongly supports a particular issue, the Consortium or the hypercorp controlling the habitat usually finds ways to modify their current policies to address these concerns without harming their own interests. In contrast, if only a small number of residents are upset by certain policies, then these wishes are ignored and corporate security forces keep an eye out for possible civil disobedience or other forms of resistance. Outside of these dedicated installations and wholly owned habitats, many hypercorps maintain offices and mesh presences in stations and planetary settlements belonging to other polities. The larger hypercorps have offices and branches all over the solar system, serving the needs of people from Pluto to Mercury and all places in between, while even smaller outfits advertise their services via the mesh on any habitat they can. Almost every habitat has a Nimbus office with a farcaster and, in the case of larger colonies, QE communicator facilities for instantaneous communication. Both facilities are open to anyone who can pay Nimbus’s fees. Hypercorps offering ubiquitous services and products like environmental systems, cloning, body bank services, banking, spacecraft maintenance and repair, and so on can be found on most habitats. In smaller habitats, these offices are unobtrusive, if not entirely virtual, and managed by limited AIs or indentured infomorphs. While postings in small habitats are often rather dull, the infomorph usually has a contract guaranteeing them a morph and resleeving in the habitat of their choice in return for a term of service, which typically ranges from three to five years. Every habitat interested in interacting with the rest of transhumanity has at least one automated Experia media node (among other news and entertainment outlets). Most Experia media nodes are managed by indentured infomorphs that monitor the local newsfinding AIs and keep track of any important or interesting developments. Experia and similar news sources rely heavily on crowdsourced journalism, paying small amounts for live feeds from any freelancers that happen to be on-site reporters as important events occur. Similarly, all but the smallest habitats have offices where individuals can hire security consultants, bodyguards, or even mercenaries from hypercorps such as Medusan Shield, Direct Action, or their thousands of competitors. These contracted security personnel range from simple AIs and guardian angel bots to highly trained mercenaries in fully equipped fury morphs. While additional forces can be farcast in, many of these security specialists are locals who live on the station and sometimes hire short-term contractors to help with especially large or difficult assignments. Skilled mercenaries may eventually be hired full-time by larger corps like Medusan Shield or Direct Action, but since contractors are usually given the most dangerous and thankless parts of any assignment, many soon lose interest in hypercorp freelance work. Other employees working out of local hypercorp offices range from nanofabrication programmers to for-hire scientists and technicians to personal financial and media advisors to the wealthy and powerful. In important habitats and planetary settlements, as much as twenty percent of the population consists of hypercorp employees or private contractors who are hired on a short-term basis when the local workload exceeds the capacity of the regular population. These workers are in the unique position of having dual loyalties—to both their habitat and their employer. Despite what hypercorp propaganda preaches, the two interests do not always overlap. Because of the delays involved in normal communication, local heads of hypercorp offices usually have a great deal of autonomy, since asking for instructions from their superiors on another habitat or installation requires either dealing with a time-lag or using expensive qubits for instant QE communication. As a result, except for the most important or difficult problems, local directors deal with all local matters on their own, reporting any unusual or potentially problematic decisions afterwards. The Outer System Out beyond the orbit of Mars, the influence of the hypercorps and the Planetary Consortium is far more limited. With the exception of the rigidly authoritarian Jovian Republic, the inhabitants of the outer system have considerably more freedom than those living in the inner system. However, even out here the struggle between the desire for freedom and the longing for safety forms an important part of the political discourse. The Libertarian and Utopian Legacies Various forms of anarchism and similar libertarian ideologies were quite common among the first transhumans who settled space in the two decades before the Fall. Many settlements in the outer system have inherited this legacy of freedom. The new frontier opened by space colonization presented a fantastic opportunity for those with a strong desire to avoid the authoritarianism of the hypercorp-controlled inner system and Earth to pursue social organizations more based in equality and collective action or even to simply experiment with new political models. Out beyond the belt, hypercorp influence was weak and preoccupied, giving resourceful colonists a chance to explore their interests unmolested. The more radical of these elements grew out of or maintained ties to progressive, anti-authoritarian, and left-wing social movements and insurgencies on Earth, drawing support where they could. Others simply stole hypercorp resources from the inner system and smuggled them to their secret projects. In a few cases, entire ships or stations mutinied, refusing corporate orders and pursuing their own path. It was rarely feasible for the hypercorps to pursue and punish such subversion. Even among these radicals, differences existed, so that those adhering to similar sociopolitical tendencies tended to group together. Over time these have developed into four rough groupings: the anarchists of Locus, the technosocialists of Titan, the anarchocapitalists and mutualists of Extropia, and the nomadic free-for-all societies of the individualist scum. These factions form a loose alliance, a united front against the hypercorps and Jovian Republic — or as they call it, the Jovian Junta—and a pact for mutual aid and support, known as the Autonomist Alliance. Among the more anti-capitalist habitats, the centuries-old doctrine of “from each according to their ability, to each according to their need” is a living and vital philosophy. The ready availability of cornucopia machines ensures that no one wants, and the use of reputation systems encourages people to be active participants towards the common good. Equitable access to morphs and augmentations is also available for residents, though the demand from so many infomorphs in need of a body means that infugees must contribute and build up social capital. However, even for an infomorph, egocasting across the solar system is expensive, and the Planetary Consortium produces large amounts of propaganda about the dangers of these habitats to discourage infugees from considering escape. Many autonomists consider themselves to be engaged in an ideological conflict with the inner system, a memetic cold war that sometimes extends to physical actions. Some willingly pursue campaigns of sabotage and subversion against hypercorp and other authoritarian interests, such as smuggling cornucopia machines into habitats where nanofabrication is strictly regulated, like among the Jovian Republic. The hypercorps and their allies occasionally strike back, though open conflict is rare. Even though the inner system and Jovian Republic could theoretically field enough military might to subdue the autonomist factions, an uneasy détente exists. Rumors abound that the anarchists have some sort of card in their pocket that keeps their opponents at bay, perhaps even some threat of mutually assured destruction. Concerns over security and potential future attacks by the TITANs also impact matters in the outer system, but most people resist attempts to seriously restrict their personal freedoms in any manner not directly related to maintaining their safety. Inhabitants of the outer system still remember how the old governments’ demands of adherence to bioconservativism and allegiance to distant and often unresponsive leaders did nothing to prevent the Fall from happening, and that memory fuels their mistrust of those states. Those powers were undone by failing to deliver what they promised — when they could not provide the security that they claimed their authoritarian measures would bring, the seeds of their defeat in the outer system were planted. Space for Experimentation Both social and political experimentation are common in many of the smaller habitats of the outer system. Because collective decision-making is fairly easy in stations with populations of less than ten thousand, direct democracy is a common method of government. The combination of collective decision-making, radical ideology, and experimentation has also led to some habitat populations adopting unusual forms of government (or non-governmental organization). The individual variants that have been tried are too numerous to list, though they generally fit into a few general categories. A few relatively small habitats employ limited forms of authoritarianism. Some have a single leader who has great power, but who is (ideally) kept from abuse or excess through the use of limits such as a list of constitutionally guaranteed rights or the ability of a relatively small number of people to call an election or a vote of confidence. Some colonies using this model have elected dictators who serve for a limited term, while others are ruled by a single charismatic leader who transforms their habitat into a cult of personality. Other habitats choose their leaders by random lot, with every adult who can pass a relatively easy competency test being eligible to be the colony’s leader for a period that usually ranges from six months to five years. A few habitats are governed by powerful specialized AIs, which in very few cases are actually hyper-intelligent AGIs. Several colonies populated by purely informorph or synthmorph inhabitants use special high-bandwidth connections to give their members access to each other’s surface thoughts and emotional reactions, allowing them to hold vast democratic political meetings where everyone present can feel the general emotional reactions of all of the other members as easily as they can feel their own. There are a vast number of different types of government, many of which have never existed before, moving (and sometimes fumbling) ahead in the outer system. Some work far better than others, allowing successful colonies to thrive and making much of the outer system a vast and complex political laboratory. Category:Setting Category:Core Book